Employment Bill [HL]

Perhaps I may intervene for the first time in the one hour and 40 minutes that we have spent on three amendments, which always happens when we get into the hands of the barristers. I support the noble Lord, Lord Wedderburn, in what he said on the procedure. I bow to no one in my respect for the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Alloway—apart from in the damage he does to microphones. I have listened to him for the past 12 years in your Lordships’ House say that amendments are not valid because they do not conform to the Long Title. Those of us who have sat through 28 pieces of employment legislation will know that Her Majesty’s Government often put in provisions that bear little relationship to the general title of the Bill. If, as the noble Lord, Lord Wedderburn, indicated, his amendment falls simply because it does not meet that procedural requirement, it is not beyond the wit of the expensively paid people behind the Minister to ensure that it does. At a more fundamental level, I wonder whether this debate is not a little premature. I heard on the radio this morning that a meeting between the Prime Minister and the trade union movement about this issue is being held in Downing Street as we speak. Would it not be better if the noble Lord, Lord Wedderburn, withdrew his amendment until we knew what our Prime Minister has decided to put forward in relation to this issue? Are we not in danger of having a theoretical debate when we do not yet know what He Who Shall Be Obeyed has decided?